as damnable, no less;
and in the early days of my acquaintance with the family I
was somewhat tempted to this opinion myself. For she not
only flouted the old lady to her face, but would upon
occasion disregard her utterly, and do it all with what I
can only call a swagger that seemed to demand a local
application of drastic measures. But Katje knew her victim,
if such a word can be applied to the Vrouw Grobelaar, and
never prodded her save on her armor. For instance, to say
the Kafirs were overdriven and starved was nothing if not
flattery--to say they were spoiled and coddled would have
been mere brutality.

With it all, the Vrouw Grobelaar went her placid way, like
an elephant over egg-shells. Her household did her one
service, at least, in return for their maintenance, and
that was to provide the old lady with an audience. It was
in no sense an unwilling service, for her imagination ran
to the gruesome, and she never planted a precept but she
drove it home with a case in point. As a result night was
often shattered by a yell from some sleeper whose dreams
had trespassed on devilish domains. The Vrouw Grobelaar
believed most entirely in Kafir magic, in witchcraft and
second sight, in ghosts and infernal possession, in
destiny, and in a very personal arch-fiend who presided
over a material hell when not abroad in the world on the
war-path. Besides, she had stores of tales from the lives
of neighbors and acquaintances: often horrible enough, for
the Boers are a lonely folk and God's finger writes large
in their lives.

I almost think I can see it now--the low Dutch kitchen with
its plank ceiling, the old lady in her chair, with an
illustrative forefinger uplifted to punctuate the periods
of her tale, the embers, white and red, glowing on the
hearth, and the intent shadow-pitted faces of the hearers,
agape for horrors.

There was a tale I heard her tell to Katje, when that
damsel had seen fit to observe, apropos of disobedience in
general, that her grandfather's character had nothing to do
with hers. The tale was in plaintive Dutch, the language
that makes or breaks a story-teller, for you must hang your
point on the gutturals or you miss it altogether.

"Look at my husband's uncle," said the old lady. "A sinful
man, forever swearing and cursing, and drinking. His farm
was the worst in the district; the very Kafirs were ashamed
of it when they went to visit the kraals. But Voss (that
was the name of my husba